Art Vandelay wrote:You guys must live in a world where there are no crooked or vengeful cops, politicians, bosses, teachers, co-workers, neighbors, etc., etc., etc.

Wait! I forgot to put on my tin foil hat today! The bad guys musta done got me! I knew to just screw that thing into my skull! Why oh why didn't I listen and understand that the whole world is crooked and out to get me?

Yes doctor, I am sick.Sick of those who are spineless.Sick of those who feel self-entitled.Sick of those who are hypocrites.Yes doctor, an army is forming.Yes doctor, there will be a war.Yes doctor, there will be blood.....

All kidding aside, as I said, with real information, the psycho would be handled and taken care of, leaving you (and any other victims) in peace. That would be a good thing.

....How? Since they wouldn't be using the internet to terrorize and annoy people, how would they be tracked down? Hell, they could get a friend of theirs or pay a random person to actually make the phone calls via pay phone and therefore removing all trace of themselves. Besides, if there's more than one person using the same internet connection, the personal information evidence is circumstantial, given that it could be anyone in the family using the computer. It would cost me a lot of money to hire a good attorney in a court case that I would probably eventually lose. It would be significantly cheaper and less insanely time-consuming for me just to not give out my personal information on the internet.

Ok, forgive me, but I'm a bit lost. Let me try to clear this up a bit.

You met the psycho on the net right? Or did you tick off the psycho in real life and it spilled over to the net?

If you met him on the net, then his info would be available and he could be held accountable for it. If you met him in real life, then at least you wouldn't be hounded on the net.

Prosecuting someone is free if you've got a case. Just takes a bit of time to fill out paperwork, so there aren't any issues there.

And as I said earlier, everyone gets a static IP and are responsible for what happens off of that IP. So if he's sharing a connection with someone or that person is sharing with him, then all parties involved are responsible.

The guy found me on Youtube and demanded that I give him a bunch of free stuff. I declined, so he went completely ape[mod edit] on me.

....So the entire family gets penalized? Or if he did some stuff from a friend's computer as well, do both families get penalized? Either way, there would be no way to prove it was him that called me on the phone, because pay phones don't have a static IP that could be traced back to the personal information of the one using it. Yes, I can absolutely prove that those 50 emails calling me a stupid idiot were sent by someone in that guy's house, but what I would actually care about is who was the one that called my family one to three times in the wee hours of the morning almost every day for four months or call several people that I know and spread some really nasty rumors (both actually happened to someone). There's no way to connect the internet IP address to the pay phone two blocks away with which the calls were actually made other than circumstantial evidence.

This guy isn't even unique. There's tens of thousands of people like him congregating on the internet on websites like the infamous 4chan. I've read some horror stories about what happened when they got the personal information of some controversial figures. Imagine if they were given the opportunity to harass whoever they want and whenever they want, just a pay phone or a proxy away.

Rocinante2: you knowRocinante2: its easy to dismiss the orioles as a bad teamofanrex: go onRocinante2: i'm doneRocinante2: lmao

Art Vandelay wrote:You guys must live in a world where there are no crooked or vengeful cops, politicians, bosses, teachers, co-workers, neighbors, etc., etc., etc.

Wait! I forgot to put on my tin foil hat today! The bad guys musta done got me! I knew to just screw that thing into my skull! Why oh why didn't I listen and understand that the whole world is crooked and out to get me?

An occasional desire--or need--for anonymity isn't the exclusive domain of tin foil hat conspiracy theory nut jobs. Off the top of my head I can think of a handful of examples just from my small town where someone had information to make public but wanted to remain anonymous where it was a perfectly reasonable request.

Do you think law enforcement agencies should have get rid of their anonymous tip lines? Should we do away with anonymous voting?